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Copyright © 2001 SAGE Publications (London, Thousand Oaks, CA and New Delhi)
Vol 1(1): 90–107 [1469-6053(200106)1:1;90–107;017624]
ABSTRACT
This article discusses several aspects of the practice of archaeology in
South America, specifically in the Southern Cone. Examining two key
issues: the socio-political context of knowledge production and the pos-
itioning of South American archaeology in relation to its European and
North American counterparts. Three cases that bridge these issues are
examined. First, Gero’s argument for gender bias in the recording of
field data, based in her ethnographic work during the excavation of the
Paleondian site of Arroyo Seco 2. Second, the reburial of the human
remains of Inakayal (an Indian chief who died at the end of the nine-
teenth century). Third, the excavation of the Inca mummies of the
Llullaillaco peak in the southern Andes. The first is a critique on
methodological grounds, the second demonstrates that Argentinean
archaeology cannot free itself from its colonial past and the third illus-
trates the ethical dimension of archaeological praxis, specifically the
complex interaction between local and foreign archaeologists.
KEY WORDS
archaeological socio-politics ● gender archaeology ● reburial issues
● South America
90
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Politis On archaeological praxis, gender bias and indigenous peoples in South America 91
■ INTRODUCTION
A few years ago I asked a Catalonian archaeologist who was giving lectures
in various places in Argentina what his impression of archaeology in the
country was. He answered dryly: ‘quite colonized’. His answer triggered in
my mind some issues which have been discussed briefly, but on the whole
insufficiently, on previous occasions. What is the relationship between the
peripheral position of Argentina and other South American countries in a
global context and the way archaeological knowledge is produced, legiti-
mated, reproduced and disseminated? Is South American archaeology, like
other archaeologies, a science exposed to the influence of scholars from
other continents where the production of theoretical knowledge is far more
significant, or is it essentially a ‘colonized’ science practiced by subordinated
third-world archaeologists? Is the archaeological knowledge produced in
the region by both foreign and local archaeologists relevant to the people
of the South American countries, especially indigenous and mestizo com-
munities (which, in some countries, such as Bolivia and Peru, are the major-
ity of the population) or, on the contrary, is it a bourgeois practice, an
exercise to satisfy the intellectual curiosity of a few, and a latter-day deriva-
tion of colonial domination? Does archaeology still retain the colonial spirit
of its origins?
These questions are still in my mind and are far from resolved. However,
I believe that a reflection on aspects of the practice of archaeology in the
region will help in understanding some of the processes related to two key
issues: the socio-political context of the production of knowledge about the
past in the region, and the extent to which South American archaeology is
subordinate to its European and North American counterparts.
In the format of a single article I have not attempted, or claimed to have
achieved, any degree of comprehensive coverage. My aim is merely to high-
light the issues outlined above in order to better understand the contem-
porary praxis of archaeology in South America, and especially in the
Southern Cone. These concerns are neither new nor exclusive to the region.
Outside archaeology, such issues have been widely discussed by Bourdieu
in numerous papers (among many others 1976, 1990, 1992), and within the
field of archaeology several books and articles have been illuminating (e.g.
Gero et al., 1983; Ucko, 1983; Trigger, 1984; Shanks and Tilley, 1987a;
Layton, 1989a, 1989b). Within this debate it has been argued that an aca-
demic archaeology that interprets past material culture is political action
which ‘operates as part of a wider cultural discourse serving to reproduce
the relationship between the dominant and the dominated’ (Shanks and
Tilley, 1987b: 188). Some have even gone further, and a more extreme pos-
ition claims that, since science is an instrument of domination, ‘scientific’
(positivist-processual) archaeologists can be seen as agents of imperial
07 Politis (JB/D) 15/5/01 1:25 pm Page 92
hegemony (Miller and Tilley, 1984). In South America, with few exceptions
(e.g. Funari, 1992; Politis, 1995; Gnecco, 1999; McGuire and Navarrete,
1999), there is an absence of reflection on these issues. These exceptions
clearly demonstrate, however, that archaeological praxis within South
America must be understood within its global, ‘postmodern’ context. As
such, and understanding the postmodern condition as a globalizing cultural
project which reflects the logic of the multinational phase of capitalism
(Jameson, 1984), it has been proposed that the praxis of scientific archae-
ology has been converted into a hegemonic exercise in accordance with this
globalizing project (Gnecco, 1999: 23).
Firstly, I would like to explain why I have defined the ‘region of study’ of
this paper as South America. I have chosen to discuss this area in prefer-
ence to the more common unit of analysis – Latin America – because, in
spite of some similarities in their Spanish backgrounds and idiosyncratic
characteristics, there are marked differences between these two regions
with respect to the issues discussed in this paper. The historical develop-
ment of the archaeology of Central America varies considerably from that
of South America, and the role played by US archaeology in the former is
significantly different to its role in the latter. Obviously, contemporary
South American archaeology is a product of its historical development,
especially over the last 50 years, when, after the Second World War, the US
extended its economic and political hegemony over South America.
In archaeology, this situation brought with it the consolidation of the
culture-history paradigm, over the kulturkreise school, as well as some sur-
viving mechanical diffusionists, and a variety of direct historical approaches
(Politis, 1995). This process of consolidation of the North American culture-
history paradigm has to be seen within the context of the way the region
was incorporated into political and economic dependence on the USA, as
well as its capacity for organizing, systemizing and giving meaning to previ-
ously dispersed groups of data. In general, the process of expansion of the
culture-history paradigm has to be understood within the context of the
transference of ideas and models from the centre to the periphery. In practi-
cal terms, the manner in which culture-history achieved dominance in the
region was quite simple.
Firstly, North American archaeologists worked intensively in the area
and significantly increased archaeological knowledge of the region within
this conceptual framework. The most notable cases were Gordon Willey
and Wendell Bennett in the Andes, Betty Meggers and Clifford Evans in the
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Politis On archaeological praxis, gender bias and indigenous peoples in South America 93
Politis On archaeological praxis, gender bias and indigenous peoples in South America 95
‘bias’ in the results. As expected, Gero concluded that there had been
androcentrism present in the recording process and a reinforcement of male
values, based on two examples. These examples were: firstly, that a male
member of the team produced larger pedestals of earth to support artifacts
than those created by a female member of the team. Supposedly, in this way
the male excavator captured the attention of the director (the author) and
‘deliberately (if unconsciously) advance his data, pushing it – and himself as
its producer – into the limelight of the excavation block’ (Gero, 1996: 269).
According to Gero, this was the outcome of a masculinist style of doing
research: more aggressive, more competitive and more strongly hierarchi-
cal. The second example used was that of a male member of the team who
marked soil stains and other features using a trowel, and mapped with solid
lines, while a female excavator did not mark out features prior to drawing
them, and used broken lines when mapping. This example represents the
‘dichotomous A/Not A logic’ (Gero, 1996). As men mapped with a solid line
they left no room for ambiguity or gradations, presenting archaeological
data in a solid, compacted manner. Contrarily, ‘[w]omen, bombarded by a
gender ideology of femininity, practice a “feminine” science in which intu-
ition and needing to feel that one has gotten it “right” often overwhelm the
politics of advancing one’s practice through the hierarchy of practitioners
competing to produce useful data’ (Gero, 1996: 272).
As I stated above, I am open to the possibility of the existence of gender
bias in any part of the process of archaeological research, but the two
examples presented by Gero to support her conclusions are trivial. There
are two basic problems with Gero’s analysis and hence the force of her con-
clusions. Firstly, over a period of about two weeks, in a group of 20 or more
excavators mapping several times weekly (after passing the plough zone, we
mapped every 5 cm, not every 10 cm as Gero stated) there are a variety of
tendencies that can be noticed regarding different recording techniques.
However, Gero paid no attention to – or at least did not publish – the sta-
tistical representation of her observations. Consequently, it is difficult to tell
whether the differences noticed were statistically relevant with respect to
gender-related practices, or whether they indicate more personal proclivi-
ties. In other words, out of many different examples it is always possible to
find one or two which fit your hypothesis. But, in the present case, how many
men and women exhibited these tendencies? ‘Hard’ statistics were not
required, merely some idea of the proportion of men and women carrying
out activities in more or less the same style. As concerns the first example,
there are additional problems with the observations which affect the final
conclusion: I can guarantee that I, as director of the excavation, was not in
the slightest bit interested in the size of the pedestals. What did capture my
attention was what was on top of the pedestals – the archaeological object.
This leads on to the second problem: there are a number of other socio-
contextual factors which could explain the types of practice noticed by
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Gero, but which were not considered in her analysis. For example, excavators
may lack or possess confidence according to the amount of excavation experi-
ence they have (this would be an alternative explanation for the size of the
pedestals or the solid lines on the maps of sediment stains), the stage they are
at in their degree program, whether they are naturally timid or confident
people, and whether they are from a privileged class, educated at a bilingual
school in Buenos Aires, or whether they are from an impoverished back-
ground and educated in a rural college. Obviously, these are also biases which
should be taken into account in the process of production of archaeological
information, but they do not necessarily indicate a gender bias or that such
bias is the prime, unique causal factor. In other words, gender bias clearly
intersects with other types of bias which were not accounted for in Gero’s
analysis. I do not want to appear churlish, but neither myself nor any of the
participants on the excavation (male or female) believe that the examples pro-
vided by Gero indicated an androcentric way of recording data. It seems to
me that these two examples do not uphold the assertion that ‘science is not
sexless, and that scientific practice is itself dominated by masculinist arrange-
ments, modes of interaction and putting forth argument’ (Gero, 1996: 269).
Politis On archaeological praxis, gender bias and indigenous peoples in South America 97
the most important landmarks in this process being The Native American
Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA) enacted by the US
National Congress in 1990, and the Federal Aboriginal and Torres Strait
Islanders Heritage Protection Act, enacted in Australia in 1984 (see review
in Hubert, 1989, 1992; Fforde, 1997).
In South America the situation is different and relatively backward in
comparison with the USA and Australia. First, it is important to recognize
that dialogue between archaeologists and indigenous peoples in the region
has always been difficult, erratic, distant and basically absent. Tombs, monu-
ments and sacred places were excavated in the name of science without any
consideration for the people culturally and historically related to them
(Mamami Condorí, 1989). Until recently, the tight control under which
indigenous people had been held since the colonial period did not allow
them to react to this situation. They were passive and suffering observers of
how archaeologists treated their dead, who were disinterred and sent to city
museums. In Argentina, as in most countries of South America, the con-
struction of a single nation with only one ‘true’ national identity was con-
sidered imperative to the consolidation of national unity (Slavsky, 1992) and
to the insertion of the country onto the world stage (Barre, 1983). The strat-
egies adopted to achieve this aim in relation to the indigenous population
were multiple: war for political domination, appropriation of lands and
resources, conversion to Catholicism, dismemberment of traditional prac-
tices, cultural alienation, etc. However, indigenous communities resisted for
centuries and in many places kept their traditions alive, which has enabled
them to re-emerge as a political force in the past decades and fight success-
fully for their rights to be recognized. By the early 1980s there were already
two indigenous representatives in Bolivia and one in Brazil, representing
their communities and making their claims heard in parliament (Ontiveros
Yulquila, 1988). The South American indigenous struggle has achieved
important successes, such as Colombia’s new constitution of 1991, which is
a good example of how new legislation can respect cultural diversity.
Although putting the constitution into practice will have to confront the
logical difficulties of the articulation of different cultural categories and cos-
mologies, it is undoubtedly a step forward.
The indigenous voice can be heard increasingly loudly and clearly these
days. Indigenous groups are nowadays in the process of organizing them-
selves and are struggling for their rights (see review in Contreras, 1988),
rights to their lands and resources, to make their own decisions, to maintain
their culture and language, and to dispose of their dead and ancestors in
their own way. The conflict with the archaeologists emerges from this last
point, and the arena of the debate is the argument over the ownership of
archaeological human remains. Of the entire region only Peru, Argentina
and Uruguay have precedents respecting claims for the return of indigenous
humans remains. In other countries, notably those with significant and
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Politis On archaeological praxis, gender bias and indigenous peoples in South America 99
Politis On archaeological praxis, gender bias and indigenous peoples in South America 101
Thirdly, the find was first published in National Geographic and por-
trayed the kind of archaeology that we would rather forget, focusing exclu-
sively on impressive and spectacular finds. As is usual for this publication
the text is scientifically poor but the pictures are attractive and of excellent
quality. Disappointingly, some of the images were truly pathetic and gave
the public a false view of archaeology, for example, two members of the
expedition holding one of their collaborators by his feet while he is trying
to rescue a mummy from the bottom of a pit (which was certainly dug from
a more orthodox excavation position).
There are some points in favor of Reinhard. Looters have discovered
other mummies, such as those found on Mount Quehuar in Peru, some of
which were blown up in the attempt to get the body and their goods away
quickly. This evidence of plunder ‘only strengthens our resolve to excavate
as many high-altitude sites as possible in advance of thieves’ (Reinhard,
1998: 134). It is fair to say that South American governments are generally
bad at protecting their cultural heritage. Cultural policies are far more
declarative than effective, and the practical possibilities of controlling
access to archaeological Andean peak sites is remote. A further point to
take into account is that the weather conditions in which an excavation
would have to be carried out at more than 5000 m above sea level are
extremely bad, and the time in which to complete the excavation would be
correspondingly short. As a result, archaeologists who work at high altitude
sites need special training and technical procedures that are quick and
effective. A third point is that the quality and quantity of data that can be
obtained from these mummies, given their excellent state of preservation,
could be highly significant. However, none of these three points justifies the
excavation of a place considered by contemporary historically related
indigenous people living in the area as a sacred site. Nor is it an excuse for
not complying fully with the authorization procedures or carrying out more
careful excavations. The other exhumations of mummies carried out by
Reinhard in the Peruvian Andes, also sponsored by the National Geo-
graphic Society, and also colorfully displayed in the pages of the Society
magazine (Reinhard, 1996; 1998), followed the same style. Essentially, the
sites were approached in order to exhume the mummies and their
accompanying funerary goods. It is unclear how the team conducted other
necessary archaeological recording or how they excavated the tombs. The
piles of dirt surrounding a few days of excavation shown in the figure on
pages 134–5 (Reinhard, 1998) is, at least, suggestive. Finally, in the case of
the Llullaillaco mummies, interaction with local archaeologists was very
limited, being restricted to a single graduate student and a pair of under-
graduate students. The rest of the archaeological community was essen-
tially ignored, especially the archaeologists and anthropologists from the
Universidad Nacional of Salta, in the province were the mummies were
found.
07 Politis (JB/D) 15/5/01 1:25 pm Page 102
■ FINAL CONSIDERATIONS
The cases summarized above raise points relevant to several of the issues
stated at the beginning of the paper. Gero’s paper underused the potential
of ethnographic research to contribute to the understanding of gender bias
in the various steps of the archeological process. Gero could be correct in
her assertions that a ‘masculinist’ style of doing archaeology is considered
to be the standard, and as such there exists androcentric bias in the gener-
ation of archeological data. However, there are many examples that show
that this supposedly more aggressive, more competitive and more self-
confident ‘masculinist’ style is not the exclusive patrimony of men. It could
be argued that many women in archaeology act in exactly this way. What
are the proportions of men and women performing this supposedly ‘mas-
culinist’ style? As such, Gero appears to make a too easy correlation
between the specific activities of men and women (in this case, one man and
one woman) and the maintenance of an admittedly existent masculinist
system. Furthermore, the case presented by Gero does not demonstrate in
a conclusive manner what she is asserting, fundamentally due to the lack of
representativity in the employment of one example out of a universe of
examples which could exemplify the opposite point, and because other
biases are not taken into account.
Gero’s article highlights how quickly and uncritically certain ideas get into
the archaeological literature and gain a level of legitimacy in the production
of archaeological theory. Gero’s article, which in spite of its originality has,
at the least, methodological shortcomings, is mentioned in a recent book on
archaeological method and theory (Hodder, 1999: 69) as a clear-cut example
of data description and gender bias. In Hodder’s book, this example is sep-
arated from the main text (in a text box), and the prestige of the author and
the importance of the publishing house will ensure that it has an extensive
circulation and important impact. Similarly, various seminars given by Gero
in North America and Europe have afforded the case a high profile in the
context of the current discussion of gender bias in archaeology. I have the
right to suppose that this rapid inclusion in theoretical discussion, high visi-
bility in a respected text and the circulation of her results in various academic
circles have been favored by Gero’s origins in the Anglo-Saxon world.
The case of Inakayal involved local archaeologists and clearly indicates
that several of them, including physical anthropologists, still consider
human remains, even those with close, ‘scientifically’ proven living descen-
dants, as an indivisible part of a museum’s collection. Over 25 years ago, the
Australian Institute of Aboriginal Studies (AIAS) proposed that the
remains of Truganini (the so-called ‘last Tasmanian’) be disposed of
immediately in accordance with her own wishes and those of her descen-
dants, because ‘[i]t was felt that the case of Truganini, a known historical
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Politis On archaeological praxis, gender bias and indigenous peoples in South America 103
person, is an exceptional one and that the moral issue involved overrides
any other consideration’ (Ucko, 1975: 7).
In the case of Inakayal, which has similar characteristics, one would have
expected a comparable reaction from the archaeological and anthropologi-
cal staff of the Museum of La Plata, but incredibly, even today, at least in
Argentina, archaeology cannot free itself from its colonial background and
the over-expressed respect for ‘the other’ remains on a declarative level. Of
course, advances have been made in this respect, but there is still no con-
sensus concerning what to do with the claims of indigenous people. Further-
more, South American archaeologists have recently been consulted in cases
of ‘re-ethnicity’: subordinated groups who claim to be the descendants of
indigenous groups that have been considered extinct (for example, the
Charrúas in Uruguay, or the Huarpes in Mendoza, Argentina). In none of
these cases have the archaeologists been able to express particularly enlight-
ened opinions, due as much to their inability to deal with living populations
as to the conceptual and operational problems that ethnic identification
carries with it (Jones, 1997).
The split between archaeologists and indigenous groups has not always
been the case in Latin America. For an important stretch of time a number
of archaeologists – notably Julio Tello in Peru and Manuel Gamio in Mexico
– were active supporters of political movements which promoted the
recuperation of the dignity and political rights of Latin American indigen-
ous groups. In spite of criticisms that this movement was a product of non-
Indians and encouraged integration with Western society (Barre, 1983), it
nonetheless signified an advance in the recovery of indigenous rights.
Archaeology had a central role in this process as a tool for the transform-
ation of social reality in favor of repressed and subordinated groups. Lam-
entably, this political commitment has become increasingly diluted, and,
with few exceptions, contemporary South American archaeologists are
passive observers of the struggles of the many indigenous groups for the
recovery of their rights and the revindication of their culture.
The case of the mummies of the Llullaillaco reveals that colonial practices
still exist in the manner in which some archaeologists from the central, devel-
oped countries conduct research in South America. Instead of considering
Reinhard as a foreign scientist sensitive to indigenous claims and involved
with local archaeology in a symmetrical relation, which he patently is not, we
can perhaps see him more clearly in the light of the title that National Geo-
graphic EXPLORER gave to the video that they made of his research – The
Mummy Hunters. Ultimately, the fact that the finding was first published in
National Geographic is not an innocent coincidence, as it has been demon-
strated elsewhere (Gero and Root, 1991) that this magazine has been suc-
cessfully promoting the hegemony of Western culture and Western
imperialism. The aftertaste of colonialism is still present in the archaeology
of South America and involves both foreign and local researchers.
07 Politis (JB/D) 15/5/01 1:25 pm Page 104
The three cases cited must also be understood in the context of the
complex set of relationships between local and foreign archaeologies, or, as
Trigger (1984) proposed, national and imperialist archaeologies, although
these groups do not always coincide nor are they always equivalent. It is fair
to say that at least in recent decades the way foreign (above all North
American) archaeologists have carried out their research in South America
is based on respect for local colleagues, with the interaction between them
symmetrical in nature. True cooperative research projects proliferate in
several South American countries. This is, however, at the operational level
of the practice of archaeology. In the theoretical and conceptual dimensions
the status of South American archaeology remains one of subordination in
respect to its North American and European counterparts. It is clear that
through their publications archaeologists from the Anglo-Saxon world exert
a disproportionate influence on research around the world (Trigger, 1984).
This is not only a result of the greater numbers of archaeologists working
in these countries, the enormous differences in resources allocated to
research and the consequently greater possibilities for theoretical produc-
tion. As I have argued elsewhere (Politis, 1995), this is the cultural coun-
terpart of the economic and political hegemony that the US has exercised
over South America, especially since the Second World War.
The archaeology of South America finds itself with a dual role. On one
side, with very few exceptions, its theoretical development is subordinated
to the central, developed countries. It follows a little (sometimes a great
deal) behind and with less sophistication the agenda put forward in the
Anglo-Saxon world. This can also be understood through the difference
that exists between the field of production (in the central countries) and the
field of reception (in the peripheral countries) which creates significant dys-
function (Bourdieu, 1990). However, South American archaeology cannot
escape the essence of its origin which manifests itself in the form of a tool
for the domination of indigenous groups through the appropriation of a
socially legitimized discourse on their past. Archaeology retains and con-
trols objects from the past of indigenous societies, not only because of the
value they hold as sources of information, but also for their symbolic
content which is co-opted in the development of the Western hegemonic
globalizing model.
Acknowledgements
To Ben Alberti for his useful comments and help with the translation, Maria Luz
Endere, Rafael Curtoni and Victoria Pedrotta for additional information. This
paper is a product of the INCUAPA project (Investigaciones Arqueológicas y Pale-
ontológicas del Cuaternario Pampeano) sponsored by the Universidad Nacional del
Centro de la Provincia. de Buenos Aires and by the Agencia Nacional de Promo-
ción Científica y Tecnològica.
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Politis On archaeological praxis, gender bias and indigenous peoples in South America 105
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